How to Avoid the Tuition Trap: A Response to Christopher Newfield

In Unmaking the Public University, Christopher Newfield asks the fundamental question at the heart of UUP's opposition to the Public Higher Education Empowerment and Innovation Act (PHEE&IA):

If the university is just another cog in an economic system that is about getting ahead, charging as much as you can, maximizing your returns, and buying your way to the top, why should the general public pay for it? Why should the general public, whose income has stagnated for thirty years, give more taxes to a system that lets the top 1 percent purchase a VIP seat, or that favors applicants from six-figure families? (182)

His question builds on what he calls "the tuition trap":

The public is worried about college affordability, but its public university raises its fees. The university thus implies it does not actually depend on public funding, since it has the private resource of higher tuition at its fingertips. The university may also deepen this impression--that it can do without more public funding--by saying how good it is in spite of public funding cuts. Even worse, it may declare strong public funding a thing of the past in order to justify tuition increases or expanded fund-raising. Taxpayers then reasonably ask, if the university does not need more money, why does it keep raising fees? And since it keeps raising fees, why should we give it more public money? (182)

In a recent post at remaking the university, Newfield turned his answers to these questions from last November into talking points for the March 4 protests. He correctly points out that at the University of California tuition increases don't actually succeed in raising much revenue (relative to the overall budget) and that the high-tuition/high-aid model puts universities on an accelerating treadmill that is not only impossible to keep up with for most, but also has real effects on access and affordability. The higher the tuition, the more student financial aid has to be increased, the more real student costs increase (even for those receiving financial aid), and the more in debt more students get (cf. Unmaking the Public University 187-189, 226-227).

Newfield is not the only analyst to have wrestled with the "tuition trap." Business officers and economists have been tracking it for years, as well. In a June 2005 study of tuition discounting from 1989-2004, Loren Loomis Hubbell and Lucie Lapovsky concluded:

Over the past 15 years, we have seen a dramatic rise in discounting. The stasis we see today could mean many things. There are several potential interpretations of willingness to pay and the effective use of enrollment management strategies to better maximize net tuition revenues. However, we continue to worry whether net tuition maximization and the commercialization of competitive pricing will become the next barrier to access. [my emphasis] Financially, greater stability in net tuition revenues will lead to greater stability for many institutions in budgeting and planning for the future.

While we believe that this is likely to be the case for the independent institutions, the outlook for public institutions could be quite different. The level of predictability of state support at these institutions has declined greatly in the past few years, leading to often-significant increases in tuition. The public sector is looking to understand how to effectively use tuition discounting to shape their classes and achieve their revenue goals. The action in tuition discounting will move to this sector of higher education. One area to watch: how the reduction in the price difference between public and independent higher education affects access. [my emphasis]

The higher public tuition levels go, the more attractive private colleges and universities look--especially to students from disadvantaged groups who can get into them--due to their large endowments and small student bodies that enable them to offer larger tuition discounts than public universities (or even go completely need-blind in admissions). But not everyone can get into highly selective colleges and universities--and most are not prepared to expand to solve the access problem generated by rising tuition at public universities.

That the interrelated crises of quality, affordability, and access are coming to a head was addressed directly by Paul Fain in The New York Times last November and indirectly by the National Association of College and University Business Officers (NACUBO) in their February summary of how federal stimulus funds have been mitigating state funding declines across the country. But nobody has put the problem (and the solution) better than Newfield himself:

high-quality, large-scale public education requires strong public funding.... [H]igh-quality education for elites is cheap, since there are not that many students involved. High-quality education for the great majority is expensive, and private sources are unable to support it....

Administrators looked to private funding to solve the problems that the ascent of private over public funding helped create. The fact remains that private funding can build great universities for elites, but private funding cannot and will not do the same for society's majority....

[A]ccess can coexist with quality only by restoring and increasing public funding for the public university. Private sponsorship can support novel and important programs on a limited scale; in public education, it is not enough to fund high-quality core operations. High-quality mass higher education requires mass public funding: there is no way around how the numbers work.... It is only through public funding that the whole society can contribute to forming the next generation, rather than relying on the generally stagnant incomes of their students' parents.... (Unmaking 193-194, 271, 273)

So if I agree with Newfield's analysis of the "problem with privatization" at UC and his proposed solutions, how can I have been offering my qualified support for the PHEE&IA all month? Why do I believe that it actually represents SUNY's best hope for avoiding the tuition trap?

First, we need to understand that total state support for public higher education is indispensable. Check out the raw totals and percentage increases/decreases in recent years. While state support for SUNY operations will fall below $1B if the Governor's cuts go through, total support for higher education crossed the $5B mark. If all of that indeed went to SUNY (obviously, some goes to CUNY), you'd need an endowment on the order of $100B to comfortably replace that chunk of change. That's why it's so difficult to scale the elite privates' funding model up. (More on endowments soon.)

Second, we need to understand that total state support for public higher education remains a bargain for taxpayers in the vast majority of states. Check out the charts for how much each state spends per $1000 in personal income and per capita in FY09 and FY10. You'd be surprised how cheap NY's investment in public higher education really is. But you shouldn't be. The more you spread around the costs of higher education, the less it costs each person. That's just simple math. What we really need, then, is a base of federal support for public higher education that states and systems can build on. (But that's a subject for another post.)

Third, in the absence of that federal commitment or of widespread citizen/taxpayer/student pressure for it, and in the face of declining state revenues (5 straight quarters in NY, according to the Rockefeller Institute) and an end to federal stimulus funding to the states, there is very little chance that New York won't cut public higher education as much as it can in 2011-2012. To keep the shock to the system from being fatal, there is very little chance that New York won't raise tuition, as governors and legislatures always have in financial crises--haphazardly, as part of an austerity program, and the result of horse-trading and political negotiations, rather than any kind of strategic planning process or education-centered budgeting program. Whether or not the PHEE&IA becomes law, then, we're very likely to see reduced state support and higher tuition in SUNY's immediate future. (While I'm hopeful that reiterating the argument that public higher education can drive regional and state-wide economic development will free up some new state funding sources for SUNY, I'm not holding my breath. More on this topic later, too.) Without the PHEE&IA, there's nothing stopping the state from sweeping tuition dollars into the general fund to close the ever-growing projected deficits in New York.

Fourth, the PHEE&IA lays the groundwork for a better way of determining SUNY's tuition and enrollment policies and for understanding what they can and can't accomplish. With the power to determine these policies comes greater responsibility--for transparency, accountability, and results. Last week, I argued that critics of the PHEE&IA are completely missing the boat when it comes to SUNY's draft tuition policy. Today, however, I want to suggest that the SUNY comprehensive tuition policy draft doesn't go nearly far enough in recognizing and avoiding the tuition trap that Newfield has identified. The more the procedural checks and balances remain within the SUNY administration's and trustees' purview, the greater the probability they'll walk right into the tuition trap.

What SUNY needs is to really hit the reset button when it comes to setting tuition and enrollment policy. That means bringing in constituencies with a variety of interests to act as watchdogs on each other from the very start of the process. Students' primary concern is access and affordability, although they, too, care about quality. Faculty's interests are primarily about quality, although they, too, care about access and affordability. Alumni's primary concern is quality, although as parents they may well end up caring more about access and affordability. Administrators can gain a lot more than they lose by bringing them in from the start, via student government, faculty governance/union leadership, and alumni associations, at both campus and state-wide levels. For one thing, doing this would minimize the possibility of the kind of student and faculty protests that we saw on March 4th in California. If representatives from these various groups were working together from the start in developing a strategy for enhancing SUNY's quality, accessibility, and affordability, which would end with the presentation of a united front when it comes to the balance of taxpayer and student/family support sought in a given year, not only would the decision-making process be improved, but its legitimacy and efficacy would also be enhanced.

Who better to make sure that SUNY stays true to its mission than the very people and groups most invested in its success? The PHEE&IA can provide an opportunity for SUNY to avoid the tuition trap, learn from successes and mistakes in other states and systems, and set a national standard for inclusiveness in financial decision-making. It's up to SUNY student, faculty, and alumni leaders to make sure the administration and trustees understand this--and act on it.

[Update 1 (7:34 am): It's worth noting that my proposal would also go far to closing the trust gap that the SUNY/UUP debates reveal. The relative silence of faculty governance across SUNY has enabled many to assume the dispute is purely and simply between management and labor, administration and faculty. In the conference call today among governance leaders, I'm going to be advocating for the UFS to take a public stand in its own, independent, analysis of the PHEE&IA.]

[Update 2 (9:24 am): Looks like Newfield and I aren't alone in our desire to see the public matter in public higher education. Check out SUNY Plattsburgh professor Colin Read's case for SUNY as an engine of economic development and the various perspectives in the March 14th issue of The Chronicle of Higher Education, particularly Twain scholar and Pitzer president Laura Skandera Trombley's.]

[Update 3 (3/16/10, 3:27 pm): It's worth noting that the draft tuition policy defines the "Executive Committee/Chancellor's Cabinet" as "Advisory groups made up of representatives from senior management at SUNY System Administration, Faculty Senate, Faculty Council of Community Colleges and Student Assembly" (2). I'd like to see these organizations, a SUNY alumni organization, and UUP made equal partners with the SUNY System Administration.]

[Update 4 (3/26/10, 2:54 am): Smart analysis of the tuition trap and strategies to avoid it by Westminster College president Michael Bassis.]

Game On! The SUNY University Faculty Senate Prepares to Enter the Empowerment Act Debate

The leadership of the state-wide University Faculty Senate for the State University of New York has been busy researching the Public Higher Education Empowerment and Innovation Act (PHEE&IA) and the debates it has engendered. Their position since late January has been that without knowing what SUNY's tuition-enrollment and asset-management policies actually are, they can't objectively analyze or evaluate the PHEE&IA, much less take a clear-cut position on it that can be easily communicated to legislators. Further, they would prefer that UFS committees and representatives get a chance to deliberate over any recommendation or proposal as to what position the body should take on the PHEE&IA. However, the next UFS plenary isn't until the 3rd week of April. Since it's possible that key votes in the state legislature will have already taken place by then, the UFS leadership is beginning a decision-making process that will put them in a position to take action as needed (perhaps in the form of a resolution that's voted on by mail or electronically?).

If you visit the SUNY Fredonia University Senate page devoted to the PHEE&IA, you can download letters from UFS chair Ken O'Brien, along with a very useful chart summarizing SUNY's and UUP's positions on the various components of the bill, which includes comments from UFS leaders on the components and positions. O'Brien has been in regular communication with leadership on both sides of the debate, and will no doubt be in much more in the coming weeks. He's seeking input from university faculty senators and campus governance leaders across the system in a conference call tomorrow afternoon.

So what role should UFS play in the coming weeks? Personally, I think they ought to indicate clearly

• what components of the PHEE&IA and SUNY policies they support;
• what components of the PHEE&IA and SUNY policies they oppose;
• what components of the PHEE&IA and SUNY policies they would need to see revised in order to support them, with specific revision proposals.

In other words, as we get closer to crunch time, it's high time to see if UFS can't broker some kind of principled compromise between SUNY and UUP that would allow legislators to divide the PHEE&IA into non-controversial and controversial parts for separate votes.

I'll have more on what I think UFS ought to propose over the course of this week.

Go Blue! Hamilton Goes Need-Blind

Thought I'd pass along the news from Inside Higher Ed: my alma mater, Hamilton College, has invested the $2M it will cost per year to go completely need-blind in its admissions policies. I wonder if there are any long-range plans to grow the college, should this policy attract more of the best students in the state and country to Clinton?

[Update 1 (10:07 am): Check out the average financial aid package that Hamilton is able to offer. The endowments of private colleges like Hamilton are so high (but not even stratospheric by the standards of the Billion Dollar Endowment Club) that they can afford to discount tuition and fees so that larger numbers of students pay less than 40% of the $50K cost per year of attendance. Just imagine what kind of aid SUNY could offer if they changed their structures to make it easier for privates to go public and pool their endowments in a single SUNY endowment.]

On "Dismantling" SUNY: A Response to Lawrence Wittner

On March 8th, SUNY Albany Professor of History Lawrence Wittner posted "Dismantling SUNY, America's Largest Public University System" on the History News Network site. In it, he argues that the Public Higher Education Empowerment and Innovation Act "set[s] the stage for dismantling America's largest public university system" by "enabl[ing] New York State to walk away from its obligation to fund public higher education and usher in a struggle for survival among individual campuses." If he's right that the PHEE&IA is a stalking horse for privatizing SUNY, then I would join him (and Phil Smith) in opposing the bill. Let's examine his argument, shall we?

After briefly tracing the long-standing and accelerating disinvestment by New York in its own state university, Wittner claims:

the Empowerment and Innovation Act takes things a giant step further, for it grants authority to the SUNY administration to raise tuition on SUNY campuses to any level it pleases. This will enable campuses to recoup losses in state revenue by charging much higher tuition than in the past. In short, the cost of public higher education will be shifted from the state to students and their parents.

What a tangled web of assumptions to unweave here!

ASSUMPTION 1: The PHEE&IA grants unlimited authority to the SUNY administration... Well, not quite. Let's look at the key portion of Subpart A of the bill:

(i) Commencing with the two thousand ten--two thousand eleven academic year, the president of any state-operated institution, in consultation with the respective student government and upon the recommendation of the respective college council, may recommend to the trustees, and the trustees shall be authorized to implement, differing rates of annual tuition upon the basis of campus or program:

(1) for students who are New York state residents in courses of study leading to undergraduate, graduate and first professional degrees; provided, however, that on or before June fifteenth, two thousand ten, the trustees shall promulgate guidelines outlining the criteria such campus or program must meet in order to qualify for differential rates. Such criteria shall include, but not be limited to, program cost, program mix, need, comparison with peer programs or campuses, economic elasticity, impact on access, fairness and measures to ensure that students are not steered toward certain courses of study based on ability to pay; and

(2) for all students who are not New York state residents, provided that the trustees shall establish maximum percentage enrollment limitations for such students.

(ii) Notwithstanding the foregoing, any tuition increases implemented pursuant to this subparagraph, other than pursuant to clause (i) of this subparagraph[,] shall not exceed two and a half times the five-year rolling average of the higher education price index. (page 56, lines 9-31)

Yes, there are serious problems with some of this language, which I'll get to in a moment. But what's worth emphasizing here is that the authority of "the SUNY administration" is limited in several ways:

(a) A campus president needs to consult with the local student government and follow a recommendation from the local college council before proposing a campus-specific tuition increase to the Board of Trustees. While this provision ought to be strengthened by adding in a requirement to consult with the local campus governance body--the University Senate, in SUNY Fredonia's case--note the several limitations on campus-level administration. Even the bounciest of rubber-stamps would find it difficult not to act as a responsible check-and-balance in the event of a proposed special tuition increase from that campus's administration. Student government representatives would run election campaigns based on their being a watchdog for student interests; peer pressure and self-interest, even more than the threat of losing their seats, would motivate them. Similarly, college councils would not want a reputation in their local community for bleeding students and their families dry.

(b) The Board of Trustees must establish guidelines based on state-mandated criteria for any differential increase in tuition. The BOT is a governor-appointed body equivalent to the Board of Directors of a corporation. They are distinct from--or to put the point more strongly, have authority over--the administration of the system and of every campus within it. Everyone in administration, from the Chancellor on down to the lowliest of management-confidential personnel, answers to them. While it's true that the SUNY BOT is only as good as the people on it, it's encouraging that Ron Ehrenberg was just named to it. Sure, we could get a new governor who wants to populate the board with political hacks, Wall Street hacks, and others with little experience in or commitment to public higher education, but passing the bill would put pressure on future governors to put people in place who are willing and able to live up to their responsibilities. In fact, I'd love to see the bill revised to depoliticize BOT appointments as much as possible, say by appointing a panel of recognized national experts to advise the governor and the state senate on BOT appointments. But whether or not we get this, it's worth emphasizing the BOT has to follow the state-mandated criteria laid out in lines 20-24 of the bill when judging all special tuition requests.

(c) The SUNY administration has already drafted a comprehensive tuition policy that further limits its authority. I quoted from the section laying out the policy's purpose a few days ago, but there's much more on structures and criteria in it, as well. Let's focus on structural constraints here. The policy creates a working group on comprehensive tuition policy, co-chaired by the heads of the academic and budget arms of SUNY System Administration, whose "membership shall include appropriate representation from all SUNY sectors, including system administration, the Executive Committee/Chancellor's Cabinet, as well as faculty and student representation" (3). Furthermore, the SUNY budget office is charged with developing implementation procedures "in cooperation with the Community College Business Officers' Association (CCBOA), the State University Business Officers' Association (SUBOA), the State University of New York College Admissions Professionals (SUNYCAP), and the State University of New York Financial Aid Professionals (SUNYFAP, Inc.)" (3). Thus, there are plenty of channels for campuses, organizations, and constituencies within SUNY to influence the formation and implementation of tuition policy from year to year, should the bill become law.

(d) The bill requires semi-annual reporting from SUNY to the senate finance committee, assembly ways and means committee, and the director of the budget of all state allocations, non-state revenues, expenditures, programs and activities funded via differential tuition, and enrollments--in total and by campus. Not quite a "When the cat's away, the mice will play" situation. If any on the state side smell something fishy, they can pounce.

In short, "the SUNY administration" has built in plenty of checks and balances, with a wide range of organizations brought in to take over the roles currently played by the state legislature. State roles are redefined, not eliminated; after tracking how well SUNY is handling its new responsibilities, the state can always propose new changes to the education and other laws governing SUNY.

ASSUMPTION 2: The PHEE&IA grants unlimited authority to the SUNY administration to raise tuition... Nothing in the bill or in the comprehensive tuition policy draft prevents SUNY from deciding to keep tuition levels the same from one year to the next--or even lower them in a given year. While the focus is on the means of deciding whether and how much tuition ought to increase, tuition increases are not required. Thus, if the state decides to maintain or even increase its investments in SUNY, we ought to see very low to no tuition increases, or even tuition decreases.

ASSUMPTION 3: The PHEE&IA grants unlimited authority to the SUNY administration to raise tuition to any level it pleases. This is a reference to the gap in the cap created by the insertion of "other than pursuant to clause (i) of this subparagraph," which exempts differential tuition from the HEPI-multiplier cap the bill otherwise establishes. More on that in a second, but let's first address the implication that "the SUNY administration" can raise tuition on what amounts to a whim. Here are those criteria from the comprehensive tuition policy that I alluded to earlier:

• Information on whether or not the state intends to provide increased funding to cover increased cost associated with as growth in mandatory expenses and the recent history of state funding of mandatory expenses.
• HEPI for the current year in which a GTR [General Tuition Rate] or STR [Special Tuition Rate] is being considered to help determine the minimum tuition increase that would cover inflation experienced by the system.
• Any additional system-wide mandates[,] such as federal compliance requirements, not covered by HEPI.
• State and national economic indicators such as the growth or decline in unemployment rates, growth or decline in the housing market, and other standard indicators of economic health.
• The availability of all sources of need[-]based student financial aid.
• Trends/data concerning campus philanthropic efforts in support of student financial aid.
• Maintaining affordable access to SUNY by current and future students, including but not limited to low and middle income students.
• In no case, shall the average GTR plus STR rate increase exceed a total tuition ceiling of __% in any given academic year in the event the state provides increased funding to cover increased cost[s] associated with a growth in mandatory expenses, and __% in the event the [s]tate does not provide such increased funding.
• With regard to an STR proposal, the extent to which GTR does or does not cover the costs associated with the specific opportunity for growth or improvement.
• Market conditions and the extent to which such conditions would or would not support an increase in either the GTR or a specific STR proposal.
• Other factors that would support fair, equitable and responsible comprehensive tuition policy. (3-4)

These criteria would have to be followed at every level, from the campuses to system administration, to the Chancellor, to the BOT. Moreover, even though the bill provides a great amount of flexibility to SUNY to adjust tuition by program as well as by campus, the definitions of GTR and STR limit that flexibility in serious ways:

a. General Tuition Rate (GTR): The base rate of tuition payable by all undergraduate, graduate, resident, and non-resident students attending a SUNY institution.

b. Special Tuition Rate (STR): An additional tuition charge payable by all students at a particular SUNY institution, the purpose of which is to invest in a unique opportunity for growth or improvement, the cost of which is not covered by the GTR.

Rather than raising tuition more on a relatively small number of students (relative to the total enrollment at a given campus), which the bill permits, the SUNY policy proposes spreading the costs of particular investments in growth or improvement across the entire student body.

However, there are some tricky details that need working out. Although the gap in the 2.5-times-HEPI cap appears to be eliminated by the policy, take a closer look at the language: "the average GTR plus STR rate increase" shall not increase beyond a fixed percentage rate cap (still to be determined). Right now, it's left implicit that the policy has to conform to the provisions of the bill. It should be made explicit that GTR increases are limited by the "2.5-times-HEPI" rule. Two examples will show why.

Let's say the HEPI is low in a given year, like 1% (for the sake of easy math). In that case, the bill caps any GTR increase at 2.5%. But since undergraduate resident, undergraduate non-resident, graduate resident, and graduate non-resident rates are already different, and the policy permits different increases for these different categories of students, in practice we're likely to see increases in undergraduate resident tuition lag behind other increases. So the "average GTR increase" is likely to end up being lower than the 2.5-times-HEPI cap. (For example, if SUNY wants to be competitive on pricing relative to the state-wide competition for undergraduate resident tuition, they could limit an increase in that category to .5% while going the full 2.5% on the other three categories, thus resulting in an average GTR increase of 2%.)

By the same token, the fixed total percentage rate increase would quickly become a more restrictive cap than 2.5-times-HEPI one once the HEPI goes above 3% or so. The closer HEPI approaches that cap, the less likely any STR proposals will be made, much less approved. And once HEPI exceeds it, the average GTR would have to decrease for any STR to be possible.

SUNY should explicitly guarantee that they won't exceed the "2.5-times-HEPI" cap when setting the GTR. Otherwise they open themselves to the critique that they're sneaking in a gap in the cap via the general tuition rate, even as they're limiting the degree to which a campus can seek to exploit the gap in the cap via special tuition rate proposals. Even more urgent is the need for SUNY to advocate for amendments to the bill itself to bring it more in line with what they actually want with regard to tuition policy. In short, they need to eliminate any possibility of whims influencing the setting of tuition. To make a good-faith effort to address concerns raised by Wittner (and UUP, PSC-CUNY, and NYSUT), they need to attempt to modify the bill, not just develop, revise, and gain approval for their recommendation on BOT policy.

ASSUMPTION #4: The PHEE&IA would allow SUNY to rapidly raise tuition to rates equivalent to the most expensive private colleges and universities in the world. Note how Wittner skillfully allows his readers to make this assumption for themselves:

what would the effect of this legislation be upon students? For hundreds of thousands, it would put a college education beyond reach. Currently, yearly undergraduate tuition at private colleges in New York State and elsewhere is running in the $38,000 to $41,000 range. At SUNY, undergraduates are paying $4,970 a year in tuition. Most of them cannot afford an increase to the private school rate, especially when one considers that another $14,000 or so must be added to the annual bill at a private or public college to cover room, board, and fees. How many families can afford paying over $200,000 to send each of their children to a four-year college? And how many, after that, can afford to send their children on to graduate or professional school?

What Wittner leaves unsaid in this paragraph is that no public system in the 45 states that have similar tuition policies as proposed by the PHEE&IA have raised tuition this fast or this high. The legitimate question of how much students and families should be asked to contribute toward supporting an education, that, on average, helps college graduates earn over the course of their working lives something on the order of $1M more than high school graduates is passed over completely. As is the equally legitimate question of what returns the state and its citizens and taxpayers get from their investments in public higher education. Instead, we get the bald assertion that "hundreds of thousands" would be denied access to higher education if the PHEE&IA becomes law. Over what time frame are we talking here? Is there nothing that can be done to preserve access to SUNY?

Of course there is. Yet not only does Wittner fail to acknowledge that SUNY proposes setting up a financial aid system specifically to preserve access for at-risk students, but also that New York state remains free to focus its efforts on supporting campus and system infrastructures (including personnel costs) and expanding its own student financial aid efforts, thereby making tuition increases unnecessary (or at least helping to minimize them). This leads to his next huge assumption.

ASSUMPTION #5: The state's goal is to reduce operating budget support for SUNY as low as politically feasible, with the ultimate aim of zeroing it out. If so, wouldn't the state be putting its weight behind creating and funding a SUNY-wide endowment, of such size as to allow interest and investment returns to replace lost state support? At SUNY's current size and configuration, we're talking a $20B endowment that would devote 5% to SUNY operations each year. It would have to be about $100B to allow SUNY to be completely self-supporting. We're not talking chump change here. It's going to take a long time for SUNY to raise that kind of money on its own.

Of course, it's possible that the state's agenda is to force SUNY into layoffs, retrenchments, and the selling, closing, and merging of campuses, so that the cost of and timeframe for privatization are minimized. That's why it's so important for all who care about SUNY's future to publicly confront their state legislators with tough questions about their intentions and plans for SUNY. Just how much educational capacity are they out to destroy in New York state? Just how much slack do they expect students and families to pick up?

If this assumption turns out to be even partially true, it's obvious that we have a much bigger problem than the PHEE&IA on our hands. It's not that the bill "allows" or "enables" the state to walk away from public higher education; if that's the state's intention, it will act on it until the citizens it's supposed to represent stand up and stop them--or replace the current representatives who support this agenda. More on this point in my conclusion.

ASSUMPTION #6: The other provisions of the PHEE&IA that streamline and depoliticize the process for evaluating public/private partnerships, land leases, and other potential revenue streams are so ripe for mismanagement, misuse, and mission erosion that they'll end up decreasing rather than increasing SUNY revenues. It's almost as if Wittner is so convinced that SUNY can't learn from other systems' mistakes or help campuses adjust best practices to our own local conditions--that failure, abuse, and corruption are inevitable results of the bill's shifting and redefining oversight responsibilities rather than the responsibilities of campuses and the system to avoid--that he'd rather keep the same oversight system that he claims has authorized ventures that "have resulted in multi-million dollar losses" than even consider a change.

To his credit, Wittner does begin to approach the key questions raised by the debate over the PHEE&IA toward the end of his essay: what should public higher education be and do, whom should it serve, and how should it be structured and financed in the twenty-first century? But he focuses so narrowly on alternate mechanisms for funding SUNY that he short-circuits careful consideration of them:

Of course, there is an alternative--and better--means of funding public higher education. And that is to pay for it through a revised tax structure. Over the past three decades, in an attempt to create a "business-friendly" environment, taxes on New Yorkers with the highest incomes were cut from over 15 percent to less than half that rate. Why not restore some progressivity to the tax structure? According to the highly-respected Fiscal Policy Institute, raising taxes by only 1 percent on New York's millionaires would yield $1 billion or more in state revenues.

Another way to fund public higher education lies in collecting the sales tax that already exists on stock transfers. Currently, New York State rebates the entire sales tax to Wall Street firms. Reducing that rebate from 100 percent to 80 percent would yield about $3.2 billion a year in state revenue. Given the fact that, in 2009, Wall Street profits were $58 billion--three times the previous posted record--paying a small portion of the sales tax on stock transfers should not be an onerous burden.

Left unsaid is the fact that these two reforms wouldn't even come close to closing the current state budget deficit facing New York, much less the much higher projected ones for later academic years. Just how much of these revenues could SUNY legitimately expect to see in the near- and medium-term?

In the end, then, I remain unconvinced by Wittner's claim that "the Empowerment and Innovation Act would concentrate income at some more powerful, appealing SUNY colleges, while leaving other campuses to wither and die." SUNY's tuition policy seems carefully crafted to ensure that all campuses have their basic needs covered by a combination of state allocations and the GTR, while campuses that make powerful appeals with broad support from on-campus and local constituencies--on STR to the BOT and on other non-state revenues to the state asset maximization review board--and follow through on them with smart execution of their strategies will be able to invest in their mission to provide high academic and educational quality at affordable prices. Even if some universities and colleges do better than others in the system at handling the responsibilities and taking advantage of the opportunities that the PHEE&IA offers them, I don't see the harms Wittner envisions as plausible risks. More to the point, the budget typhoon heading New York's way in 2011-2012 is no conjurer's trick.  I still haven't heard a convincing argument why we shouldn't be doing everything in our power to improve the PHEE&IA, to address legitimate objections, and to get an insurance policy in place in case reality turns out to be worse than projected. To head off that eventuality, we'd be much better off developing arguments convincing to everyday New Yorkers for growing SUNY than in pretending that killing the PHEE&IA would stop or even slow the momentum toward dismantling SUNY generated by New York governors and legislatures over the course of decades. How to reverse this inertia is the primary political problem facing everyone who wants to see New York's state university reach its 100th anniversary as a public higher education system.

On Raising Enrollments: A Response to Arthur Hauptman

Over at Inside Higher Ed, Arthur Hauptman wonders why more public higher education systems haven't more systematically tried to raise enrollments during the downturn, rather than capping them and raising tuition. If other SUNY schools are anything like mine, they have been raising enrollments, at least relative to the targets SUNY has established. The point is that we're just about reaching the point where the costs of this strategy start to outweigh the benefits. And if New York state keeps cutting us at the rate and scale they have been of late, we're running out of good or even decent options--fast. We'll muddle through this year and students won't feel the cuts all that much, but something has to give in 2011-2012. That's why I've been so adamant about sounding the alarm lately. Everyone in Albany and across the state needs to face reality and think big about the future of SUNY. We need to debate the fundamental issues, not just ticky-tacky talking points. Let's get to it, people!

[Update 1 (3/10/10, 6:44 am): Our campus is involved in a master planning effort right now, taking a comprehensive look at how we are using our facilities and physical plant and imagining what kinds of learning environments and infrastructures we want to provide for our students. One thing I've already recognized as a result of my limited participation in and knowledge of this process is how little space we have at SUNY Fredonia--whether in classrooms, office space, and student housing--and how we've had to shoehorn ourselves into existing, and in many cases outdated, structures. Without investment in these areas, we simply can't expand enrollments much further.]

[Update 2 (3/15/10, 12:31 pm): Dean Dad offers some more reasons there are built-in limits to raising enrollments.]

Truth in Advertising; Or, Don't Send Out a Paper Airplane that Can Be Shot Down by a Spitball or Four

"DON'T BE FOOLED BY THE ACT. KEEP SUNY PUBLIC!"

Looks like the Full Metal Archivist and I can't even take onechan, imoto, and their friend out to brunch at the local diner after a sleepover party without having our stomachs assaulted by a "Paid Political/Advocacy Advertisement" with UUP and NYSUT logos on it, "Paid for by United University Professions," in today's Buffalo News. The stick to Jonathan Epstein's well-researched carrot on the economic impact of state investments in SUNY's medical schools like Buffalo HSC, this UUP ad directs readers to go to SaveSUNY.org and "Tell NY lawmakers to keep SUNY public." Unfortunately, rather than presenting a hard-hitting case outlining the danger to SUNY's future posed by the Governor's cuts and persuading taxpayers to pressure their representatives to keep investing in SUNY, the rest of the ad repeats the same tired talking points, leavened this time with even more misleading rhetoric and strangely out-of-date content. It's even more in need of a rewrite than the Public Higher Education Empowerment and Innovation Act itself.

So let's go "FACT" by fact on UUP's critique of the PHEE&IA, starting with:

FACT: The Act would not produce additional revenue for SUNY. The state would pay less; students and parents would pay a lot more.

Here's how this one should read:

EDUCATED GUESS: We're pretty sure that with state revenues declining, we can't count on state legislators to restore the Governor's cuts. Since in this economy we're afraid to appeal directly to the citizens and taxpayers of NY to stand up for SUNY, nor do we trust them to be moved by arguments in favor of finding efficiencies elsewhere in the state budget and making NY's tax system more progressive, let's pass over our effectively conceding the point that the state is likely to cut SUNY this budget year no matter what. It's been doing that for a generation and more and none of our lobbying has done much of anything to stop or even slow it, so why should this year be any different? OK, then, how do we get the attention of students and parents? How about scaring them into believing the PHEE&IA will lead to immediate and massive tuition increases? Great, let's run with that!

How is this a winning strategy? All this talking point does is put UUP in a position to say, "We told you so" if the PHEE&IA passes and tuition increases are offset by state cuts. That's useful--not! What students, parents, and SUNY need are good reasons from UUP that the state should invest in public higher education, irrespective of whether the PHEE&IA passes. They need to understand that continued state support--in the form of salaries and benefits for SUNY employees to help keep SUNY affordable, as well as improved financial aid for students (including both grants and fairer access to cheaper credit) to help keep SUNY accessible--are necessary if the system is to avoid massive layoffs and/or the selling, closing, and merging of campuses. And that these investments in the mission of SUNY bring large and varied returns to the people and places of New York.

OK, next:

FACT: The legislation would eliminate state appropriations for tuition and other revenues, so there is no guarantee that student tuition and fees would be used to benefit students or the academic mission of the campus. Quality would suffer.

What is UUP really claiming here?

RED HERRING: Never mind that New York state already has used tuition dollars for non-educational purposes (i.e., to help close its massive budget deficits via the "tuition tax"), so that the current system, where student tuition is counted as state money, provides no guarantee of anything. Never mind that in the current system, where students and families pay the state rather than an individual campus, the state could find itself "forced" at any time by fiscal "necessities" to deny SUNY any or all of those dollars. And certainly never mind that specific language in both the bill and the comprehensive tuition policy draft circulated by SUNY System Administration four months before the PHEE&IA'S June 15th deadline to campuses, legislators, and the Board of Trustees for comment and improvement tie the use of tuition, fees, and other revenues directly to SUNY's mission. No, no, no--whatever you do, never assume that there's competent and responsible leadership at any level of the SUNY system. Actually, the only thing stopping SUNY from misusing your money are UUP and its friends in the legislature. So take our word that not only would the PHEE&IA end SUNY's affordability, it would also undermine SUNY's quality.

As I've already shown, this claim is based upon a tendentious misreading of language that's already in place and in effect in New York state education law and unchanged in the current bill. Don't take my word for it: go to S. 6607/A. 9707, Subpart A, Section 8, page 57, lines 12-24. Whatever the funding source, SUNY is obligated to create a budget in line with "its objects and purposes" and "under regulations prescribed by the state university trustees." The horror! The horror!!

OK, next:

FACT: SUNY could place a surcharge on tuition (differential tuition) that would vary by campus and program without limitation. Student access would be denied.

Sorry, Charlie! Try to keep up with the facts on the ground:

EX-FACT, FOR ALL PRACTICAL PURPOSES: Let's pretend that SUNY has not responded to UUP's and others' critiques in its comprehensive tuition policy draft by giving up on program-specific differential tuition, closing the gap in the cap, changing the cap to a (still-to-be-determined) fixed annual percentage rate rather than a multiplier of the HEPI, clarifying the procedures and criteria for a campus to request a "special tuition rate," and incorporating specific language and policies to ensure student access. Conceding that would confuse students and families. Until the language of the PHEE&IA itself has been changed to prevent SUNY from arbitrarily changing its policy once the spotlight moves away, better to hit our one good talking point over and over and over, even if it's only technically possible for the worst to happen.

Actually, I can't blame UUP too much on this one. I want the language of the PHEE&IA changed to (a) take away the possibility of any of this coming back down the road and (b) require legislative approval of SUNY BOT tuition policy, including any future changes to it. While I believe it's better to acknowledge SUNY's improvements and directly call for language that would further improve the bill, I can understand that UUP wouldn't want to let its one effective talking point go to waste, simply because the facts on the ground have changed. I guess.

OK, next:

FACT: There's no evidence that public/private partnerships--especially those created without government oversight--raise revenue. In fact, SUNY's previous joint ventures have cost taxpayers millions.

Really? More like:

BACKPEDAL VIA WILD GUESS: Our original talking points expressing "serious reservations" due to "insufficient oversight" were too wishy-washy and wonky. So let's pretend that Phil Smith never wrote that "SUNY's previous experiences with joint ventures" were the result of "special bills enacted by the Legislature" (22 February 2010 letter to UUP members). Wouldn't be good to remind New Yorkers that even legislative oversight sometimes isn't enough, now, would it? No, no, better to imply that the "lost revenue" Smith wrote about in his letter to the membership is really wasted taxpayer dollars (rather than, say, private investments that didn't pan out). And pretend that past results guarantee future outcomes--"failure once, failure forever" is our motto. Let's call the whole thing off.

Yes, there have been problems with public/private partnerships in the past. The key question, then, is how to avoid them in the future. Minimizing the amount of and risk to taxpayer dollars is one obvious strategy. But instead of contributing further ideas, UUP hints that there is no solution, and can be none.

In short, the only thing UUP's ad convinces me of is that they either haven't seen SUNY's comprehensive tuition policy draft or wish they hadn't seen it. How could they have approved their ad in light of the following language from it?

Purpose of a Comprehensive Tuition Policy

The purpose of this policy is to ensure that tuition pricing for the State University of New York is fair, equitable and responsible by: 1. maintaining affordable access to the institution through a supplemental grant program, funded in part by a portion of tuition revenues; 2. tying tuition increases, if any, to predictable and incremental economic indicators, thus allowing students and their families to better manage the cost of pursuing a SUNY education; and 3. ensuring that SUNY fulfills its potential and responsibility as a driver of the State's economic growth through the reinvestment of all tuition revenues in the execution of SUNY's mission based strategic plan.

PHEE&IA is specifically designed to complement but not relieve the State of New York of its responsibility to support accessible and affordable public higher education. Appropriate levels of state funding, and SUNY's ability to control its own tuition policy, is the only method of ensuring that SUNY can reinvest all of its traditional tuition resources in the growth and development of its campuses, the development of SUNY Aid...and in terms of growing private philanthropic support.

Yeah, the language is rough, but it doesn't hurt my appetite or my digestion the way UUP's bad ad did. If there are any truth in advertising requirements for political ads, UUP is in a lot of trouble. In any case, floating a paper airplane that can be taken down by a few spitballs does little to bolster UUP's standing with the public or with legislators.

[Update 1 (3/8/10, 12:00 am): Where in Nancy Zimpher's latest op ed is the call to privatize SUNY? And why can't UUP's leadership sound more like the University of California at Berkeley's Wendy Brown?]

"Multiple Ways to Salvation": Ohio State President a CitizenSE Fan?

Very interesting to see that Ohio State University is considering versions of ideas I floated here at CitizenSE years ago in a cross-blog dialogue with AFT's Craig Smith and other bloggy interlocutors on rethinking tenure (which became a vehicle for rethinking governance and administration, too). Ohio State's focus has shifted to criteria and policies for promotion from associate to full professor, which sheds interesting light on the massive multi-year revision of personnel policies that has just left the Fredonia University Senate as a formal recommendation to the presidents of the campus and local United University Professions chapter and is now a labor-management matter.

All well and good, but I'm also interested in AAUP's ideas about expanding the tenure system to include faculty currently considered "nontenureable" because of their contingent, adjunct, part-time, etc. status. So lots to keep talking about in addition to budgetary matters....